Saturday, November 3, 2012

7th Sea: Beasts

The Judge explained to me that a membership to the club was to be had for complete silence about anything going on behind these walls plus five hundred florin. I agreed that this was a very reasonable price. Actually, I would have expected a test of loyalty of some sorts, at least it's what I would do if I were so inclined to host such a club. Something to ensure that any new member would thoroughly incriminate himself. But I was rather relieved that they were too confident or too stupid to think of this.

In the meantime the others all had found their way into the house, as I was later told. De Chevalier had a run-in with the Madame, whom he convinced to talk to him - she is indeed something of an unwilling partner in all this. Ramon found Lucia, only to be surprised by Logan.

While Logan waited for Lucia to gather up the cat, who had followed her here, Ramon decided to investigate the other rooms and walked in on de Chevalier and the Madame. He withdrew, not waiting long enough to realise that the situation was harmless, and was caught out in the open when du Doré came up the stairs. Ramon managed to slip into a doorframe and du Doré walked by without seeing him, entering one of the rooms. Logan and Lucia joined Ramon, only to be surprised by du Doré who had seen Ramon's reflection in the window at the end of the corridor.

Du Doré accepted the challenge to a duell with Ramon. He took a shot at Logan, deliberately misaiming and told Ramon to keep his Avalonian dog from barking. The shot rang through the house and alerted the Judge, the Ussurian and me to the fact that something was wrong. We ran upstairs to see what was happening and I came just in time to see du Doré lunge at Ramon, thrusting his rapier deep into Ramon's chest. He didn't strike with his usual surgical precision, though, and Ramon was not only left alive, but in a shape to fight.

Logan aimed his musket at me and we silently agreed to keep the masquerade up a bit longer. The Judge and the Ussuran came up the stairs behind me and I heard a roar from the Ussuran - he was transforming into a bear. I had read about this, but I had never before seen it and I'm in no hurry to see it again. The bear attacked and Logan shot at it, but that didn't slow it down very much.

Lasombra, Lucia's cat, did slow the bear down. I have no idea what he exactly is, but he changed shape as well, into a fully-grown panther and threw himself at the bear. Du Doré decided not to wait for any more surprises, shot out the glass of the window behind him and climbed to the roof, with Ramon in pursuit.

I followed them, although I knew that I could not interfere with the duell. Of all the things I have done in my life, standing there on the roof and watching the duell was one of the hardest. Ramon managed to injure du Doré, but failed to parry a second lunge that drove du Doré's weapon deep into his chest. I looked on in horror as Ramon fought to keep his balance. He dropped his rapiers and collapsed to his knees when du Doré drew his blade out of the wound.

I was sure that Ramon was dead, but I had no intention of allowing du Doré to deliver a coup de grâce and I threw a knife at him. At the same time, he took a step back, gloating over his victory. Which is not a bright idea when one is standing right at the end of a roof. I'm not even sure I hit him. In any case he lost his balance and fell. I was just in time to grab Ramon who was slipping off the roof.

He was barely alive and I'm not sure he will survive. I did get him inside through a skylight and I did my best to tend to his wounds. I stopped the bleeding, but I'm no surgeon, which is what he would need.

I'm tired, it has been a very long day. I'll continue this in the next letter, for now know that I love you and that I wish you could be here.

Marcello

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It's really, really hard to die in 7th Sea. Nonetheless, Ramon's player almost managed it and it made for some very powerful scenes. He wanted a challenge and du Doré certainly was one. For those interested, the swordsman school he used is called Snedig, from Vendel.

It was a very close call. Ramon failed to parry that last lunge by just one point and if he has sustained one more wound, he would have been dead. The player told me that for a moment he came close to simply letting Ramon fall to his death from the roof after du Doré had pulled his rapier out and it would have been a wonderfully dramatic scene. But I'm glad he didn't do it and so is Marcello.